After growing tired of listening to the hype, I finally caved and bought a 32" OLED to replace my 27" IPS display. There was nothing wrong with it, though I did want something that was easier on my eyes for both work and play. I've seen and used them briefly at trade shows, other people's houses, and have an OLED TV, so I'm not a complete stranger. Despite that, I still wasn't fully prepared for just how massive the shift was, and these are the 5 biggest things that caught me off guard after I made the switch from IPS to OLED.

The brightness

I simply wasn't ready

I was satisfied with the brightness of my IPS display. I would crank it up while gaming to fight the washed out blacks and help the contrast levels a bit, and overall, it looked good. I always heard about how brightness can be a sticking point with OLED, and while I wasn't going to be using it in an area where ambient light is a problem, I really wasn't ready for how bright these things can get.

My Samsung G8, even at 50% of its maximum brightness, is bright. Looking at anything in SDR that's completely white feels like a flashbang, and I found myself turning the brightness down a lot when working with anything static. Automatic brightness control is often an annoyance for me rather than a helpful feature, so I had to keep the remote handy. For gaming and media, though, setting the brightness to max only enhanced the experience, and I was in love with the way it looked. I really wasn't ready for either side of this spectrum, the good and the bad.

Motion clarity

The hype is real

When it comes to response times, IPS is decent. I've really only used TN and IPS panels for monitors, as gaming was one of the primary use cases for my PC. I always knew that motion clarity was highly touted on OLED displays, but until I actually gamed on one for real, I didn't fully grasp just how good they were in motion.

It made my IPS and TN panels look sluggish in comparison, even when running at a lower FPS and refresh rate. Along with the panel upgrade, I also went from 1440p to 4K, so naturally there was some performance loss, even when using an upscaler. Despite that, the experience was crazy smooth, and it's difficult to explain unless you've tried it for yourself.

Being hyper aware of static elements

Even when I don't need to be

I knew going into the OLED experience that it wasn't really recommended to use one for productivity, and I was fully ready to deal with the consequences of that. Static elements like taskbars and web browsers can cause burn-in, so leaving them open became uncomfortable. I feel like I need to constantly be moving them around in order to limit the potential damage to my display.

In reality, the actual risk is pretty low, even when you don't use the built-in features. When doing productivity tasks, the brightness of my display is usually set to the lowest it will go, and I use dark mode wherever possible, which will further limit any kind of damage. There are multiple burn-in tests being done by tech YouTubers, namely Monitors Unboxed that are currently ongoing, and even after 18 months of intentionally burning in his OLED, the actual effects are difficult to notice under normal usage.

HDR is actually real

IPS just doesn't do it justice

One of the things I was most curious about when I went from TN to IPS was the inclusion of HDR. I had always heard mixed things about it, and when I finally did try it, I was pretty disappointed. Clunky Windows settings aside, the HDR experience on an IPS is pretty subpar, even at the best of times. The image is often dark, and the lack of per-pixel backlight control makes HDR feel like nothing more than a spec to include for marketing’s sake.

HDR on OLED is a true HDR experience. I still haven't used it as much as I'd probably like to, but when I have consumed full-HDR content, it looks utterly gorgeous.

The price is justified

I was expecting to feel at least a little bit slighted by the cost

While I knew it was going to be a big jump, the cost of a 32-inch 4K OLED for gaming isn't cheap. The Samsung G8 that I purchased cost around $1400 CAD after tax (that's around $1000 USD for my American friends), and even on sale, I was fully expecting to feel slight regret around the purchase.

So far, I have absolutely zero buyers remorse. My complaints are relatively few: the OSD being a cut down version of a smart TV interface sucks, and the fact that I had to connect my monitor to Wi-Fi and accept the terms and conditions to perform an update rubbed me the wrong way. Besides those, though, the actual experience of using the monitor day-to-day couldn't be any better, and honestly, I didn't expect to be this pleased.

I'm an OLED believer

It’s rare that a display upgrade feels truly transformative, but switching to OLED absolutely did. I've upgraded to ultra-high refresh rates, higher resolutions, and larger sizes, but nothing compares to the jump to OLED. The brightness hit harder than expected, contrast looked perfect out of the box, the motion clarity blew me away, and HDR finally delivered what it promised. It still absolutely has its downsides, but with a good warranty and some careful usage, I'm not worried about this monitor's usable lifespan.